"Under Her Skin," which runs until September 30, 2013, at Atomica Gallery, Hackney Downs Studios, features fine art celebrating modern female tattoo culture by some of the best female tattooers. "Under Her Skin" will be also exhibited during the London International Tattoo Convention, September 27-29.

At tonight's event, you'll get you hands on the latest Things & Ink issue, which, once again, has a gorgeous cover, proving that you can show beautiful tattooed women in a way that isn't cheap. The cover art is inspired by Millais' iconic artwork, Ophelia, with tattoo artist Tracy D. Check the video below for a behind-the-scenes look at the shoot. Within the magazine are more fantastic recreations of iconic fine art work with their own "tattoo twist," along with art historical commentary from Doctor Matt Lodder.

As editor Alice Snape notes in her Letter from the Editor: "The issue covers tricky topics, such as tattoo etiquette (when does
inspiration turn into copying?), and tattoos as art. We also spoke to
artists who have had their own work used as tattoo inspiration. One of
my personal highlights is an interview with iconic artist Jack Vettriano, as I have been a huge fan of his work since my teenage years."

Editor Alice Snape brings us the third installment of her marvelous tattoo magazine, Things & Ink where the theme is all about love, baby! In her words:

The issue is all about love, in all it's glorious forms. It explores love between lovers, friends and family, passion and romance throughout history. Paralleling love as an emotion with a love for tattoos. There's also an in-depth interview with Rachel [Baldwin], an exclusive competition to win an original by the cover star herself, plus lots more...

They've also put together a wonderful behind-the-scenes video of Rachel's cover-shoot (which is scored to a NoFX tune so, obviously, I'm pretty giddy about that fact alone).

Things & Ink pride themselves on their tagline: "Embracing Female Tattoo Culture," but I personally find the magazine to be gender-neutral - or in the words of the Slinky jingle: "It's fun for a girl and a boy!" Everything from the articles to the paper-stock to the typography are a pleasure to read, hold and view.

More importantly: they eschew what, in my opinion, is the blatant misogyny of the majority of tattoo magazines. When I pick up a tattoo magazine, I want to see great features on tattooing and images of great tattoos. If I wanted to see images of naked, minimally-tattooed women in provocative poses, well, that's what my subscription to Playboy is for; and to be honest, I only read that for the articles. (No, seriously, I swear).

Perhaps that's what "Embracing Female Tattoo Culture" actually means: we're here to appreciate the art, not objectify the person wearing it. If so, it's a sentiment that I strongly support and I'm glad that it's done so through such a quality product; and it's also a sentiment from which other publishers in the industry could certainly learn a lesson.

So, I tip my Vassar College cap to everyone involved with Things & Ink on a job well done and encourage everyone of all genders out there to dive into this magazine!

Around the beginning of the month, I received the premier issue of Things & Ink magazine from the UK. I dragged myself home after an extremely trying day at work, and in zombie mode, made my way to the mailbox; as usual, I started opening up the envelopes in the notoriously slow ride up the elevator to our apartment. I get to Things & Ink just as the elevator stops at my floor. I stay in the elevator pouring through the magazine. Brian says, "Babe, let's go." I say, "Look at this," and show him the magazine. He says, "Ah, you're finally happy now."

With Things & Ink, editor Alice Snape has created a love letter to tattooed women.

It's an answer to the growing misogyny in tattoo media, especially in the US, where the presence of female tattooists is limited, but there's an abundance of women sucking on their fingers and grabbing their breasts, barely showing any tattoos at all. Now, I have no problem with T&A. Hell, some of my good friends (as the cliche goes) are porn stars. But porn is porn. Don't dress it up in the name of body art when it's just about young, skinny, and mostly caucasian bodies. The great hypocrisy here is that I write for such magazines. The editors have graciously allowed me to feature women artists and also men who don't normally get the press they deserve. For this, I'm grateful. But my little articles are sandwiched in between the hot tattooed chick of the month and an interview with some rock star with bad tattoos. And it makes me sad.

What Alice has done is show the tattoo world that you can have a sexy but also smart, inclusive, and fun publication without bowing down to the lowest common denominator of sleaze and celebrity gossip. I'm getting real tired of reading about Kat Von D's different boyfriends.

Things & Ink describes itself as a "magazine that embraces female tattoo culture, for artists, collectors and those yet to go under the needle.
[...] Each issue is filled with beautiful images, real-life stories, tattoos, opinion pieces, fashion, inspiration, art, artists, history, beauty and much more." And it absolutely delivers, all 92 pages, from front to back cover.

Speaking of, it was a fabulous idea to put well respected tattooist Claudia De Sabe on the front cover, recreating the iconic image
of Artoria Gibbons, a heavily-tattooed circus lady in the 1920s. All the wonderful people behind the creation of the cover are listed in this blog post, and you can check the backstage footage from the shoot in a video by Papercut Pictures, embedded below.

Inside the magazine is everything from beauty and fashion to personal essays to artist profiles to tattoo history (including text from the wonderful Amelia Klem Osterud, author of "The Tattooed Lady: A History," a must read). I particularly dug the Old School for Girls article, which recreates the traditional pin-up for a female audience, exploring "women's ruin," with fun artwork of some male cheesecake in old school tattoo fashion. But really, it's hard to list all my favorite things in the mag because it's all a refreshing delight. So I asked Alice what her highlights are and here's a bit from what she replied:

The current issue is everything I want to read about myself. I love reading people's opinions about tattoos, so I love the pieces about people's first time. Before I got tattooed, I would love to have read something like this. The thing I am most proud of is the cover, it is perfect. I adore the picture of Artoria and I have always admired
Claudia so it is so perfect. It was an honour that she said yes to being
on the cover, it really does mean so much to me.

It's a quarterly magazine, and the next issue is out in February, just in time for the Brighton Tattoo Convention. Alice says the issue will explore cosmetic tattooing and face tattoos. Even more awesome, they just wrapped a photo shoot with Mo Deeley, a 54-year-old woman who is covered in tattoos and only started getting tattooed a year ago. Also, Amelia will be writing about Lady Randolph.

We'll let you know when that next issue is out. Meanwhile, you can view the latest news about Things&Ink on Twitter and Facebook.